


The Casual Abduction Of Dr. Hannibal Lecter

by HyphenL



Series: We Should Be Lovers [3]
Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types
Genre: Abduction, Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Protective!Will, non graphic torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-13
Updated: 2014-01-08
Packaged: 2018-01-04 13:18:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1081473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HyphenL/pseuds/HyphenL
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hannibal is abducted by a criminal who wants to get back at Will. The man sends videos of Lecter's abuse to the FBI to mess up with the Agent. Graham gets all worked up over it and grows increasingly protective of his missing friend. Hannibal grows annoyed, merely because that cancelled his trip to Florence. </p><p>[Inspired by I don't remember which prompt from the hannibalkink]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. My therapist won't make it to our appointment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This day at work starts like any other for Will: crappily. Then he learns Hannibal has gone missing and decides to change that definition for: I'm going to downright murder everybody. Especially you Jack, shut up.

 

When Will Graham reached Jack Crawford's office this morning, he found it crowded: Alana Bloom, Beverly Katz and Agent Crawford were all already there, deep into a heated conversation that stopped dead as soon as Graham appeared.

“Well, ain't I a mood breaker” William chuckled tensely, avoiding everybody's eyes... and noticing they were doing the same. “What is it?” he asked. “Did I forget to put pants on today?”

“An abduction” Crawford answered before Alana could do so –she looked at him in resentment. Apparently, they weren't on the same page about telling Will the details of said crime.

“Are we out of murderers then?” Graham said in a light tone, trying to brighten the atmosphere. “So much that we have to go after abductors instead?”

Alana sighed. “Jack and I are having a difference of opinions about this” she said. “I believe you shouldn't be put on the case.”

“And I think Will is our best shot here!” Crawford exclaimed hotly.

“That wouldn't be good for him and you know it!” Alana retorted sharply.

Will glanced at Beverly, who pursed her lips and bolded her eyes to signify her being fed up with the whole argument. He was about to ask for precisions when his cell phone rang, so he decided to take a few steps back to answer it in a quiet spot.

As he noticed the name “Hannibal” appearing on the screen Graham smiled, feeling already calmer, and a tad curious at what could push his therapist to call him so early in the morning.

“Who is it Will?” Alana suddenly asked, getting out of the conversation to focus on him worriedly.

“Nothing, it's probably just for rescheduling” Graham answered, mentally pushing her presence away to prepare himself to hearing the deep, smooth voice that would made his day bearable.

“Dr. Lecter?”

“If it's from Hannibal you shouldn't answer” Alana said, almost jumping to him –but being caught up by Jack on her way. Her glance to him was murderous.

“ _Hello there, Agent Graham_ ” a silky voice answered –not Hannibal's. “ _What a displeasure to hear you_.”

“Uh. Hello” Graham answered, startled.

“Tracing!” Jack shouted immediately, looking at Beverly who was already typing madly on her computer. “Get me something on this, Bev'!”. He then took his own phone to transmit directive to the scientific team.

Alana was gritting his teeth and looking up in defeat. Will started to feel a tad worried.

“ _Do you remember me, Agent Graham?_ ” the voice said over the phone. “ _No, I bet not. I'm Hugh Johuo, Boris Johuo's brother. You know, the one you put in jail_.” He spat the last word with such bitterness Graham almost startled. “ _The one who hung himself there... Do you remember now, or should I make you?_ ” The threat in his voice was obvious, yet Graham couldn't fantom how that could actually happen over a phone.

“I remember” Graham said –although he hadn't know about Boris Johuo' suicide. “What do you want?”

The man was walking around, Will could hear his steps and the slight buzz of air around the phone.

When he stopped walking, Will could _feel_ him looking at something over the phone.

“ _He doesn't cry much_ ” he said.

“Who?”

“ _Your therapist. I have to say, after all I've done to him, I would have imagined he would have broken by now._ ”

Will sensed his heart freeze, and his ears started buzzing.

He'd been put on speaker phone thanks to Beverly; he suddenly noticed the embarrassed looks that everyone was sending him, or rather, how much they were avoiding to look at him directly.

“He's done nothing” Graham blurted. “He has nothing to do with your brother's arrest, or with his death.”

He heard the man on the phone chuckle.

“ _I've been watching you, Mr Graham_ ” he mused. “ _You spend a lot of time with this one. Just like I used to with Boris._ ”

Graham swallowed. “What do you want from me?” he asked. “Do I have to go somewhere? Meet you? You know the FBI is already after you. No matter how smart you are, you will get caught.”

Hugh Johuo chuckled again. “ _I know_ ” he said, and at the same time Will could hear a sharp hitting noise, like a pliable branch whipping bare flesh, promptly followed by a muffled, sibilant intake of breath.

“ _Ask for the tapes_.”

He hung up.

 

Will was petrified. He heard the others talking around him, but the only thing he could think of was that Hannibal was going to die, because of him.

“I could trace the call” Beverly said –which got him off his paralytic state of mind. “It was moving along a railroad. I think Johuo's aboard a train.”

“Alright, give me the name of the line and I'll have the team analyse it” Jack said. “Send them a map of the trace too.”

“Am on it” Beverly answered.

“How was he on a train with an abducted psychiatrist?” Crawford asked.

“Part of the audio seems to come from a recording” Beverly answered. “I bet Dr Lecter wasn't actually with him at the time.”

“Is there a lake somewhere near the railroad?” Will asked, shutting out the thought of a missing Hannibal.

“Hum, yeah” Beverly said. “The railroad goes on a bridge, over the Lago Negro.”

“Isn't that near the place we found Boris' first victim?” Jack remarked. “Drowned?”

“I'd start with there” Graham said. “The phone's probably already been thrown in the lake.”

“Maybe we'll have witnesses” Beverly exclaimed, jumping on his one cell phone to organise an impromptu interview of the still travelling passengers.

Alana had approached Will and put a hand on his shoulder. “Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked. “Working on a case you are so implicated in?”

Jack was calling the Lago Negro station to establish a perimeter of security and impede anyone to get off the train.

Will thought about all had been said, about all he knew about the Johuo brothers. Twins. Boris being mentally unstable. Hugh a brilliant student with no history of violence whatsoever –even though both of them had been brought up in a terrible family environment.

“He talked about tapes” Will recalled. “What tapes?”

Alana froze, and Jack used his being on the phone card to avoid answering.

“ _Alana_ ” Will growled.

She cringed. “I don't think you should see them” she said.

“I don't care what you say, just show me the damn thing” Graham snapped, brushing her hand away. “Why haven't I been told about this? Since when do you know?”

Alana lowered her eyes, then turned them aside entirely. “The first tape was delivered at twelve a.m. this morning. Lots of fingerprints and dirt, presumably from where Hugh lives. He isn't home and nobody has seen him since last thursday.”

Graham nodded. “Have we checked on Hannibal?” he asked, not noticing he was referring to his therapist by his first name.”

“He was supposed to take a week-end off” Alana said. “Fly over to Florence for a couple days, and come back on next wednesday, according to what we found at his office.”

Graham cringed at the idea of police officers rumbling around in Hannibal's things.

“We called his airline company and the hotel he'd booked in Italy. They said he hasn't showed up; and it was definitively his phone Hugh Johuo was calling from.”

So he had much probably truly fallen pray to a vengeful brother. By his fault.

Graham shuddered. “I want everything you have on this case. Tapes, videos, every single details.”

“The lab is still working on most of that” Jack remarked while he was waiting for someone on the phone.

“ _Do I look like I care?_ ”

Graham stormed out of the room, going straight for the lab.

Jack and Alana exchanged a confrontational look.

“You can't put him out there now” Alana said. “If Hannibal dies –even when he sees what he's been going through– there's a very good chance he snaps.”

“He's our best shot” Crawford replied. “He's the only one good enough, and willing enough, to save Dr Lecter, and you know it.”

Alana bit her lower lip. “This could break him, Jack.”

He lowered his eyes.

“Well, let's just hope it doesn't.


	2. My therapist would have won an Oscar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As he was abducted, Hannibal didn't notice he was being filmed too.

Hannibal was growing increasingly annoyed at people mistaking him for a victim. His abductor had not considered him dangerous even if for a second, which might ironically have been why he succeeded in knocking him off that easily.

The simplest plans usually are the fittest.

Later on, when he woke up in a sober room, by the looks of it a disused quarter of surveillance, his clothes torn up and dismissed in a corner of the room, he sighed. His plane for Florence would be very much missed.

They were broken surveillance screens in a corner, and a couple of dead cameras too. The one by his couch made him wary –but its lens was covered in dirt and its “recording” light off. Anyway, the one, crude lamp there was flickering, which couldn't be good for any electrical equipment.

There was a bag by his head, on a rusty chair by the bed, half open, revealing a bunch of messy clothes.

His attacker walked around nervously, a blunt knife in his hand, and an almost empty bottle of vodka in the other. He stank of drunkenness and pain.

“May I inquire about the reason of my being here?” Hannibal asked calmly, curious about the identity of the young man. Educated, smart, clearly not looking forwards to what was going to happen, yet hurt enough to want it very much.

 

“ _Shut up_ ” Johuo spat harshly.

Graham couldn't see the man, because the camera was aimed directly at Hannibal's face and torso, hidden somewhere near it so even when the therapist's eyes brushed over it, they didn't seem to notice its presence.

“ _Could I at least get a simple cover for my modesty?_ ” Hannibal tranquilly added, displaying his tied up hands. “ _It is quite freezing here_.”

Graham's lips twitched in a semi, unhappy smile. _His modesty_.

Johuo approached the man with a cat o'nine tails in his left hand.

“ _Do you think I care about you?_ ” he said. “ _I knocked you out, I tied you up, and now you are going to die._ ”

Hannibal twitched his head a little on the side, and Will felt his heart cringe in fear. _Please don't say anything stupid, please don't say_ –

“ _Are you a killer, Mister..._ ” he seemed to be looking for the name. “ _Johuo? You are Boris Johuo's brother, I believe_.”

Graham gasped in astonishment.

 

“That's an amazing memory that you have there, Doctor” Johuo said. Then he hit him harshly with the whip.

Hannibal clenched his teeth, not willing to cry, not when it was unnecessary.

This man didn't want to hurt him. This wasn't about _him_ at all.

Johuo would kill him without an afterthought, because he considered Hannibal a means to an end.

“You haven't killed anyone before” Hannibal stated, reading on Hugh's features that wasn't very much true –and understanding at once what it meant. “Or have you?”

“I told you to shut up!” the other cried, hitting him again harshly.

 

Graham closed his eyes. He couldn't bear the sight of Hannibal getting hurt –yet the man hadn't whined even once. He merely gritted his teeth together, and his eyes got lost in a sort of haze, a daydream that probably sent him to the sunny shores of Italy.

Will looked at the time of video remaining –thirty six minutes and twenty seconds. But there were more tapes.

Deeply put off, yet fascinated in spite of himself by his therapist's stoicism and perspicacity, he resumed the film.

The more Hannibal talked, the easier it was to understand what truly led Johuo to act has he did. He had indeed killed Boris' first victim, probably by accident, yet let the blame fall on his mentally hindered twin brother. When Boris had killed again in the same way, he'd known it was his fault, that he'd started it, because his brother acted out of trauma –he had witnessed the first murder and repeated it.

Now he was trying to have Graham bear his guilt... or to get himself caught.

Even thought watching Hannibal getting beaten turned Will's stomach, part of the young man couldn't help marvelling at his therapist's acuity. He'd pinpointed Hugh's true motives almost instantly, doing a better job than the best FBI profilers in that.

Doing a better job than him.

Now that he thought of it, Hannibal usually put him on the track of the killers, hinting at things Graham hadn't thought of by himself.

Yet he acted and looked so proper, so casual, that nobody had noticed the extent of his cleverness. Not even Will.

Graham twitched.

He had to get his therapist back.

 

Hannibal's phone had been thrown out a train's window alright. And many witnesses had seen it, too: it had jumped off into the lake with the man who was carrying it. Johuo had planned his escape thoroughly. The railroad passed only a few meters over the Lago Negro, and clear tracks had led them to a road, where they'd discovered Johuo had taken a cab to the nearest city with a set of dry clothes. But from there, nothing. A few camera shots around street corners.

And Johuo was getting angrier, releasing his guilt and rage unto Hannibal.

He couldn't stand that the other man didn't cry, barely whimpered, almost never cringed. He'd used a bigger whip and thorny branches, and eventually his blunt knife to carve him up.

Hannibal seemed immune to most of it, and looked at him going with curiosity, sometimes adding in a sharp comment that, at first, had terrified Will by they carelessness.

Poking the tiger to see it bounce.

Seven videos later he almost chuckled at them, emotionally exhausted and bordering nervous breakdown.

The only thing he had so far was that the room was probably situated in the woods, near a large, likely disused property, in spite of what his equipment suggested. Thorny branches weren't that easy to come across in a city.

 

“Why are you so intent on hearing me cry?” Hannibal asked with curiosity when Johuo had came back with a syringe. “You don't enjoy my suffering that much.”

“It's not about you.”

Hannibal had wondered about that. About whom, then? Aside the abuser himself, obviously. It's always about the abuser in some way.

Someone in the police forces probably. Who had been on the Boris' case?

And how? Lecter had checked, the cameras didn't work. Was Johuo scarring him to display his work later on? Something didn't add, which Hannibal did not like.

On the first day of his stay he had figured a means of escape, and now merely waited for opportunity.

But when Johuo plunged that syringe in his arm, he felt it might take a tad longer than expected.

 

The drug had done it. Graham wasn't sure what Johuo had given Hannibal, but it had severely hindered his control over himself.

Strangely, it hadn't made him react openly to pain, just whimper a bit more.

Though when Johuo had given up, leaving for the night yet letting the lights and camera on, it got horrifying.

Hannibal had nightmares. Not nightmares, downright terrors. Graham's own nights sounded like peaceful psychedelic walks in comparison.

Lecter screamed, cursed, and trashed. Something in the drug must have gone pass his carefully built up walls, and revealed a breach in his psyche that nobody suspected.

“He's speaking Lithuanian” Beverly said when she'd came up to give him the translation later on. “Well, other european languages and Japanese too, but mostly Lithuanian.”

Graham looked at the screen then adverted his eyes.

“You look awful” Beverly said. “Have you slept at all? I know this is important to you, but you won't find him by starving your mind up.”

“I can't sleep” Will answered. “I always wake up, thinking about a lead I might have missed. But it's always a dead-end.”

“We've looked for every matching disused property and we're searching others now” Beverly said. “We are bound to find something.”

“What if I'm wrong? What if he's gone out of the state? Maybe he doesn't want us to mock us by showing that we can't see what's right under our noses! Maybe he wasn't that reckless!”

“We'll find him.”

“You don't know that.”

A sound onscreen made him sigh. “What's 'mischa'? He keeps repeating that word.”

“It's a name” Beverly said. “Apparently, his little sister's, who disappeared during an earthquake in Lithuania. He lost his parents too.”

Graham swallowed. He hated that they had to rummage in Hannibal's past like this.

He hated that he liked it.

Both of them orphans.

Beverly watched at the screen, then cringed. “I can't watch that again, I'll go back to the lab” she said. “I'm running an identification for a particle of dirt we found on Hannibal's phone. Let's hope it'll be helpful.”

Graham nodded, and waved her goodbye dismissively.

Then he put the video back to the start, and looked at the translation he'd been given.

There had been much less videos since monday, as if Johuo was running out of them. At least, that's what Graham felt. Forensics suspected everything had been filmed on Saturday an Sunday night alone, considered the state of blood coagulation on Hannibal's body.

What they hadn't said was, that meant Hannibal was probably already dead.

Watching the video again with a translation felt both ridiculous and horrible. Each cry, each trashing, was accompanied by a neat, impersonal:

 

2:30:45 LITHUANIAN I don't want you to...

2:30:56 LITHUANIAN I don't want you to...

2:31:13 LITHUANIAN Don't go in the house!

7:36:23 JAPANESE Please.

7:36:52 JAPANESE Look at me.

7:37:12 JAPANESE Don't go away.

7:38:14 JAPANESE You taught me.

7:38:25 JAPANESE You taught this to me.

7:38:42 JAPANESE Don't leave me.

15:32:15 FRENCH Expelling me?

15:32:21 FRENCH On what ground?

15:34:38 FRENCH Oh no, the loss is all yours.

15:35:24 FRENCH I will simply move to Italy.

15:35:37 FRENCH I was told Florence is a beautiful city.

24:12:34 LITHUANIAN He's my friend.

24:12:56 LITHUANIAN He's my friend.

24:14:23 LITHUANIAN I don't want him to get caught in the Ripper's web.

24:14:34 LITHUANIAN He's not up for it.

24:14:46 LITHUANIAN Let him live.

24:14:59 LITHUANIAN Let him live.

 

And at the end of the night, when he'd cried so much he fall back, exhausted, tears had slid on his cheeks, and he'd murmured: “ _Misha, I am sorry Mischa, I am so sorry._ ”

Then he'd closed his eyes.

 


	3. My therapist deserves to be slapped. Or kissed. Maybe both.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal escapes his captor badly injured. Unaware of this development and fearing the worst, Graham goes to Hannibal's office.

On thursday afternoon, Graham was simply thrown out the office, with the specific instruction to eat and get some sleep.

They hadn't been sent new videos. It had been confirmed the ones they had had been filmed only for a day and a night.

Nobody added: “before the kill”. Nobody had to.

Graham dragged himself to Hannibal's office. He wanted to put a card on the door that informed his patients their therapist would probably not be around for... an undetermined time. Hannibal didn't have a secretary, so some patients would already be complaining about his missing his appointments of the day.

He arrived in front of the massive wooden door and, out of habit, out of idiotic hope, pressed the doorbell. The sound resounded like a death bell in the empty building.

Will used the spare key he'd borrowed from forensics to get in.

The waiting hall was empty. It felt cold and void without the knowledge of Hannibal's burning presence behind the office door.

Quietly, as if he were about to enter a church ( _or a tomb_ ), Graham pressed the metallic handle, and pushed the office door opened.

He was met with Hannibal's surprised gaze from behind his work desk.

“Will” the therapist uttered, in a slightly roughened voice. “Although I enjoy your visiting me, I am very surprised you wouldn't wait for me to open the door.”

One of his eyes was half covered in bandages, and hospital bandaids showed from under his shirt at his wrists and neck. His hands were unusually gloved.

“I wish you don't find me discourteous, but I've had a slight health issue and cancelled all my appointments for the week” Hannibal explained. “Which, unfortunately, includes yours, though I hadn't have time to make the call yet.”

“A... slight health issue” Graham repeated, his voice shaking lightly, taking a few steps up to Hannibal.

The older man, who was supporting himself on the desk with visible effort –visible to Will– gave up and carefully sat down.

“Please, take a chair” he said, gesturing to furniture. “I'm afraid I cannot help you out with it, as I'm still quite weakened by the fever.”

Graham would have slapped him. He joined him in few, large steps and took his therapist's head his his hands.

Hannibal looked stunned.

“What happened?” Graham asked, pretending to examine his wounds, curious to know what lie Hannibal had made up to preserve his dignity.

“Nothing too special” his therapist said. “I got hit by a car on my way to the airport. I spent the last few days in the hospital, which was really not as amusing as going to Florence, I can assure you.”

“Hit by a car” Will said, unable to stop his stroking of Hannibal's face and hair. He hesitated about telling him that everybody knew. He didn't want to be the one to break the news to him. To see his dignity shatter.

But the alternative... would be Jack, and that couldn't be good.

Hannibal gently pushed Will's hands away, and straightened his hair. He was, admittedly, astonishingly good about concealing his trauma. Or was he in denial?

“I know you were not hit by a car” Graham said gently, half-sitting on the desk.

Hannibal scrutinised him, his face unreadable. “What do you know, then?” he asked cautiously, while rearranging a pen on his table to make it even more parallel to its border.

Graham swallowed. “I– I don't know how to break it to you” he stuttered. He looked at Hannibal's deep, dark eyes, waiting for his statement without a hint of fear.

“You were filmed” Will said, hoping it wouldn't break Hannibal down.

The older man adverted his eyes, looking away.

“I would like to be alone now, Will” he said calmly, arranging his pen again.

Graham hesitated.

“I'm not saying you have to talk about it, but it might be better if someone stayed with you. And I'm not saying me –unless you _want_ it to be me.”

Hannibal pointedly avoided his eyes.

Will bit his lip, then lightly touched the man's on the shoulder.

Hannibal stilled even more.

“Should I give you details about what you should wait from the Bureau when they learn you're alive?” Graham tempted. “Or should we wait? I don't want to push you.”

Hannibal glanced at him for less than a second, with pleading eyes. Graham felt his heart sink. He gently, thoughtlessly put his arms around his friend.

“It's fine now” he said. “You're safe.”

Those words sounded empty, but he didn't know what else to say.

However, timidly, Hannibal rose his arms to embrace him, putting his forehead against Will's chest, which felt oddly good.

It felt good to Hannibal's too, eerily. He'd been furious to learn that he'd missed such a golden opportunity to mess with the Bureau –especially Jack and Will. He'd played with Johuo, but the target could have been much more interesting.

Moreover, he would have to find a way to get the video back... videos? How long had Johuo been filming? Had he filmed the end of the meeting?...

“Can I ask one thing? How did you escape?” Will asked gently, stroking his hair.

This gentle hand on his head made Hannibal shiver. It was so good after a week-end of hurting he felt himself leaning into the touch.

Graham noticed. Hannibal was pressing against his chest, though not excessively. For such a distant man, this was quite exceptional.

“He released me” Hannibal said, making it sound like as if he was on the verge of concealed tears. “He untied me and pushed me out in the woods.”

Pure truth, though Hannibal wouldn't add that Johuo had killed himself afterwards.

He had to find out if he'd been filmed while persuading him to do so.

“Can I ask something in return?”

“Anything” Will promised comfortingly.

“What... You said it was filmed. When... What's on the video, Will?”

Graham tensed up. “Until now, we have only Saturday, day and night. Nothing else arrived since monday. As if he'd flown the country or... killed himself, which seems quite probable, as he released you.”

Hannibal had burnt the place afterwards, making it look like Johuo had done it. With a bit of luck, every video that had not been edited and sent on Sunday had been erased then.

He felt Graham's fingers slide through his hair. It sprinkled his brain like crackling electricity.

Will hadn't really thought about what he was doing, until he heard Hannibal's involuntary hum. He immediately got his hand off, and Hannibal backed away.

“I'm... sorry” Graham stammered. “I don't know what came into me, that was inappropriate.”

But the tired, almost lost look Hannibal sent him seemed to indicate the man was ready to accept anything from him now.

 _Anything_.

Graham feels a quiet warmth bubble in his lower stomach.

He moves away, walking nervously. “I should call the Bureau” he says. “Tell them that you're alive.”

Hannibal's eyes widen. Will knows he's thinking of the interrogatories that will bare him to all right after the statement is made.

Graham takes the office's phone. “You should pack for a few days” he says. “And take the list of the clients you still have to call. I'm taking you away for a time, until you feel better.”

His thumb is already typing Jack's number. Hannibal seems surprised.

“You've taken care of me” Graham says, going back to him and gently stroking his shoulder. “Allow me to return the favour.”

Just for a second Hannibal is truly, genuinely startled. He listens to Graham calling the Bureau from his office, and telling bluntly to Jack that he was removing Hannibal from the investigation from now. He heard the Agent retort at the top of his lungs that Graham was obstructing Justice and that– William hung up.

“We're going” Will said. “Do you want to take something with you? A change of clothes, perhaps?”

Hannibal is still utterly surprised by Graham's decision. For the first time in years, he's overcame by a situation. William seems pleased to have surprised him, and smiles.

“Maybe we should forget about going to your home first” he says. “Jack's probably sent everyone he can to both our houses.” He takes Hannibal's hand to help him get up.

Hannibal doesn't have to fake a certain stiffness. He had to take an important amount of pain killers to escape from the hospital.

Graham takes him gently to his car, helps him sit down, makes sure he's comfortable. He even makes a pillow for him out of his vest. When the car starts up, Hannibal is wondering how to use the situation to his advantage.

Part of him is merely tired and wishing he's made the necessary to hide the true nature of Johuo's death.

And his heart seems light like a bubble of soap. He hears the car vibrating around him, he can feel the presence of Graham, his warmth, the weight of his sight when he check on him.

For a time, his mind calms down, forgets about manipulation and games.

Now he's fine.

Now he's happy.

He closes his eyes, and lets sleep take him away.  


	4. My therapist gets abducted again. By me.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Hannibal's abduction, Will takes him away to protect him from Jack's inquisitive mind. Jack is not pleased and Hannibal sleeps a lot.

Graham rented a single room with too beds in a renowned hotel, giving fake names and asking for the utmost privacy. He knew Hannibal's face had gotten himself in Lound's Tattlecrimes articles since the abduction –Johuo hadn't been subtle. He truly wanted Graham to suffer, and had sent a copy of the tapes to many reporters, that were not confiscated quickly enough.

So Graham did his best to made himself and Doctor Lecter unrecognisable before entering the place, giving Hannibal his own glasses to make him less memorable.

It apparently succeeded in making him attractive to the hotel's staff.

But once in the room, they were safe.

Obviously Graham didn't let go of his chase of Johuo, and kept comparing woods on Internet maps while Hannibal slept. As a break, Graham went to a nearby town's café to call Hannibal's patients and reschedule their sessions with him. He'd left his and Lecter's cellphones at the office, and definitively parked his car in the hotel's garage, hoping it wouldn't be recognised too quickly.

He'd also left a message to Alana, explaining the situation and asking her to care after his dogs for him. He felt he was imposing on her, but truly needed the help.

When Hannibal woke up long enough to tell him about his place of abduction, Will sent Jack an e-mail.

He didn't bother checking for an answer, taking time to care for Hannibal instead. He didn't really cook him chicken soup, using the hotel's phone to order quality meals, bandages and pain killers. They barely got out of the room. For two days, Hannibal mostly slept. Graham suspected he shouldn't have be let out of the hospital that quickly. They watched the news, which were astonishingly devoid of their wanted profile, and ate in silence, Hannibal being truly exhausted.

Graham, who helped him disinfect his wounds and change bandages, wasn't surprised by it. The older man should have slept for a week straight after what had been done to him.

Sometimes, he found himself wanting to kiss the cuts better. Shame that old trick didn't actually work.

After two days, they were found out. Jack showed up himself at the bedroom's door, fuming.

“You're not waking him” Will ordered when he noticed who their guest was.

Alana was then entering the room, followed by two armed Agents.

“Agent Graham, you have removed a witness from Justice, thus obstructing it; your licence is now under suspension for an undefined amount of time.”

“Which means I can finally tell you a piece of my mind” the other retorted. “You can throw me around like a puppet all your want, but I won't let you mishandle my therapist so.”

Crawford frowned, then rose his voice.

“You think I've mishandled you Graham? _Is that what you think?_ ”

“Don't play bossy with me, I'm under suspension” Will retorted. “And if I have to punch you to keep you away from Hannibal, I _will_ do it.”

“Hand me over your gun and badge.”

“They're in my car” William replied, opening his arms to greet Alana with the hug she was offering.

“How is he?” she asked.

“Awfully weak. I think we should get him to the hospital. Away from Jack.”

Crawford seemed taken aback by his Agent's lack of trust.

“Can I see him?” Alana asked.

“Try not to wake him. He needs the rest.”

Jack didn't ask for invitation, clearly sensing he wouldn't be getting the honour. Will followed him warily.

“I'm not going to wake him” he told Will, looking slightly hurt.

“No, you're just going to jump at his throat as soon as he cracks an eye open” Graham cringed, going to sit by Hannibal on the bed. “I've sent you every piece of information he gave me. A description of the woods, the names he recalled, everything. I didn't try to keep you away from Johuo. I'm trying to keep you away from Hannibal.”

Said man was stirring, slowly waking up. He blinked twice when he noticed the company.

“We've been found out” he uttered tiredly. “Peace truly is a chimeric dream.”

“How are you?” Alana asked with a gentle smile.

“Exhausted” Hannibal admitted, straightening up. “Alright Agent Crawford, please fire away. I already told Will all that I know, but I'm sure you have questions of your own.”

The look on Jack's face was priceless. Hannibal enjoyed his newly found victimhood, and the self doubt that was invading Jack's mind at his Agents overprotective reactions.

He also enjoyed Graham's hand on his, gently stroking it like he'd used to those past few days.

“We will get you to an hospital first” Crawford cringed, clearly wounded.

“I would rather go home” Hannibal said. “And hire a private nurse. I have a lot to take care of.”

Crawford sighed. “We'll get you an ambulance.”

Hannibal pouted, and Graham gently said he'd go with him.

Jack was about to order his suspended Agent to actually stay to answer for his actions, but he felt better of it. Instead, he asked Will to follow him in the corridor, leaving Alana to take care of Hannibal.

“If you're expecting apologies, well you can sit on that” Graham immediately blurted out. “And if you want to take my badge away for good, just do it already. I'm _not_ leaving his side, and I'm _not_ letting you near him as long as he's in that state.”

Crawford studied the nervous face of his colleague, more determined and fired up than ever.

“I would never have expected you would bond that deeply with him when I appointed him as your therapist.”

“He's my _friend_ ” Graham stated. “I know how you handle interrogatories, and I won't have that with him.”

“I am not that severe” Jack sighed.

“You are plenty awful, from a psychiatric point of view. You barge in people's psyche like a bull in a day fare.”

Jack couldn't help a snort. “Alright. Let's say, this once, I let this slide. But you don't put me in this position ever again.”

“As long as Hannibal stands clear of serial killers, we should be fine” Graham agreed. “You know, I'm not doing that against you. I'm doing this for him.”

“I know. Though you're still suspended; the Bureau has to know we don't take insubordination kindly.”

“It's fine, Hannibal needs me anyway.”

“ _Needs_ you?”

“More like, could use a hand” Graham corrected. “Any progress on Johuo?”

“You would have known if you weren't suspended” Crawford answered.

“I just want to know if Hannibal's still in danger.”

“Aren't you forgetting you were his main target?”

“ _Were?_ ”

“He killed himself. Hanged, after putting fire to the surveillance cabin he'd used. Everything's ash, we only could identify him from dental records.”

Graham nodded.

“I think we should destroy the tapes.”

“The case isn't closed yet. Judges need the evidence.”

“Don't let anyone see them. Freddie Lounds did damage enough.”

Crawford scrutinised him warily.

“Should I be worried that you care more about a therapist than about the Bureau?”

“Remember the saying? 'You fall in love with the Bureau. The Bureau doesn't fall in love with you'.”

“Are you in love with Dr Lecter?” Crawford half joked, attentive to Will's reaction.

“He's my friend” the other replied. “And I'd like to check on him, so unless you have anything to add, I will be on my way.”


	5. My therapist deserves to be slapped, take 2.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once Hannibal has healed, Will scolds him for not asking for help and keeping his emotions bottled up.

“Is that you, Will? Please, come in. I am glad to see you.”

“How are your wounds?”

“I am getting better, thank you” Hannibal answered, while cleaning up his desk. “I will even be able to go back to practice next week. I have been calling my clients to tell them so.”

“Even I?” Will asked, actually a bit wary. 

Hannibal smiled. 

“My practice wouldn't be complete without the presence of my favourite patient.”

Graham took irritated steps forwards towards his therapist.

“You were attacked because of me.”

“I was attacked because someone decided to do so” Hannibal corrected. “You are not at fault.”

“He planned to kill you.”

“Yet he failed, majorly so.”

Graham pulled on his own hair, and Hannibal tilted his head.

“What is your point, Will? To convince me you are actually guilty of what someone else did? Have you asked Mr. Johuo to come at me, perhaps?”

“You are... You are _impossible_ , Hannibal! How can you _not_ be moved by what happened? The guy tortured you, drugged you, and filmed all of that to sent it to the news and us. How can you not resent me at least a little bit for it?”

Hannibal got up from his desk and approached the fuming young man. “Perhaps because I know you would never have wanted this to happen to me” he explained. “Perhaps because you took good care of me during your weeks of suspension. Perhaps because we are friends.”

He leant casually against the ladder that provided access to his book shelves. 

Graham wiped his face with a hand, to calm himself. 

“Alright” he said. “Alright. Can I see your wound? You know, the knife one, I don't have to see them all.”

It had become an habit for him to help Hannibal with his bandages, so the request wasn't that odd per se. Though the therapist felt it strange to unbutton his vest, jacket and shirt in the stark middle of his office. 

“Are all the bandages and stitches gone?” Will asked, following with the tip of his fingers the reddish line that crossed Hannibal's chest –among others. 

“As long as I don't strain myself, I should be fine” Lecter answered. “I just have a bit of anaemia left, because of blood loss, but I make up for it by eating red meat. Fortunately, I have lots of it in stock.”

Graham nodded, inspecting lightly the rest of the visible wounds. 

“And your leg? Do you still have to go to reeducation?”

“Once a month, though I do most of the exercising by myself.”

Graham sighed, then mutterer distractedly: “ _This one, I would have shot with pleasure_ ”. 

Hannibal pouted, annoyed at the missed occasion. 

Finally, Graham started buttoning Hannibal's shirt up. “I'm glad you're healing” he said, looking preoccupied.

Hannibal took the man's hands in his, curious to see how angry he actually was. “It wasn't your fault, Will” he say gently. “I don't want you to bear such guilt while you have nothing to reproach yourself. Johuo's action were all his own. I want you to stop blaming yourself for what happened to me.”

“Goddamnit, Hannibal!” Graham shouted, releasing his hands to bang loudly on the ladder by Hannibal's head, then grabbing both sides of it with whitened knuckles. “Goddamnit!” he repeated, less heatedly. 

“You can't expect me to feel nothing about what happened!” he exclaimed, looking at the other in the eyes. “You can't expect for me to ignore the fact you got hurt, terribly, because someone wanted to get back at _me_.”

Pinned to the ladder by a cage made of two arms and a body, Hannibal considered Will attentively. 

The younger man was furious, yet desperate, probably hating himself because of the events, and his eyes shined in feverish anger, brown curls dangling around them like a beautiful black crown incrusted with sapphires. 

His body was very close, very warm, and Hannibal could feel the heat burning his thighs and stomach, where it was closer, making him slightly uncomfortable. 

“I can't believe you suffered so much before this would feel like nothing to you” Graham murmured sadly. 

“Why would you say such a thing?” Hannibal cringed, deciding the game wasn't worth it and pushing Graham away.

But Will seized him firmly by the wrists and pushed him back harshly against the ladder. 

“You can't keep it all in, Hannibal!” he exclaimed, looking truly worried. “You can't just go on like nothing happened.”

“You seem to forget that I am your therapist, not the other way around” Hannibal retorted, his breath oddly short, feeling his heart pounding in his chest and buzzing in his ears. 

“I'm not speaking as a psychiatrist, but as your friend!” William shouted, desperate. “I just want you to be okay” he pleaded. “I just want you to be okay...”

He lowered his neck, his forehead resting on Hannibal's clavicle. An eery flight of tingling butterflies seemed to emerge in the older man's chest. The hands circling his wrists felt hot and heavy, like a reassurance that the world was real. So did the weight of Graham's head against him. 

Though the whole made Hannibal's heart race inconveniently, provoking a strange fever of both burns and cold all over his self. Even his usually carefully controlled breath was a bit erratic. 

“I am okay” he told Will, gently. “And I am glad that we are friends. This brought us closer, not apart, if that is what you fear.”

“I don't get you” Graham murmured, lifting his head up. “You're way smarter than most profilers I've met. You're way better than I. You probably were an equally brilliant surgeon. And you enjoy the spotlight –why don't you ask to join the FBI?”

“Maybe because I don't want to wear a leash” Hannibal answered. 

Graham chuckled, and let him go. “Admittedly, you're also much better at life choices than I” he grinned, and Hannibal smiled too. “Though I want you to promise me something” he added, more sternly. 

“Anything within my power” Hannibal answered. 

“I don't want you to keep everything to yourself like this. I know you like control, maybe that you crave it, but I can't stand the thought of your being alone with nightmares. God knows I know what I'm speaking about.”

His hands were now unconsciously resting on the ladder, on each side of Hannibal's hips. 

“If you need anyone, I want you to talk to me” Graham added, at Lecter's pleased surprise. William was making the game so much easier on them. 

“You have my word” Hannibal answered. “Though that doesn't mean I will suddenly become very chatty; I never shared much personal matters.”

“I'm not forcing your hand” Will answered. “Just offering opportunity.”

In his chest, Hannibal's heart was like a bubbling casserole of melting caramel, which felt very rare. “You are welcome for that” he said.

William smiled, then leaned in and, nonsensically, Hannibal's eyes lowered almost closed while his chin slightly lifted up towards the younger man's jaw. 

But Graham was just regaining equilibrium after having leant on the ladder. 

“I will be on my way then. I'm supposed to go pick up my badge and gun back at the Bureau today. I'm expecting another scolding from Jack's part as the musical accompaniment. Call me if you need anything.”

Furious with himself for having mistakenly read William's intentions, Hannibal swallowed his hurt pride and nodded. “Don't let him push you around” he advised. 

Graham smiled –something that turned Hannibal's inside into something akin to warm soup– and went. 

As soon as he was out Hannibal leant back against the ladder and let out a heavy sigh. 


End file.
